Prima Donna

by Drewry, Laura

  “Screw what’s easy,” Ellie growled. “Any one of us would be happy to go with you.”

  “I know.” Regan nodded slowly, forcing her voice as steady as possible. “I do, thank you. But Carter’s a guy—he won’t get all emotional and shit like you all would.”

  “Well Jayne and Maya might, but I wouldn’t.”

  Regan grinned at the forced gruffness in Ellie’s voice.

  “Right,” she said. “Because you’re such a hard-ass.”

  “Damn right.”

  They rode in silence the rest of the way until they pulled in behind Ellie’s store and got out.

  “Don’t forget to pick me up in the morning!” She tossed Ellie the keys and hustled across the empty lot to the front of the clinic where Carter was waiting, leaning against his car casually as if they were going to get groceries.

  Ooooh, this was a bad idea. She needed to be strong today, needed to brace herself, to leave any soft, emotional weakness right there in the parking lot. But seeing him standing there, with his warm slow smile, only made her want to walk right into his arms and stand there all day instead.

  “Ready?” He opened the car door, but Regan stopped a few feet back.

  “M-maybe this isn’t such a good idea,” she said. “It might be better if I—”

  “Get in, Red.”

  “But—”

  In one step he was beside her, his hand pressing gently against her back. “You can tell me why it’s such a bad idea while we drive. Let’s go.”

  And before she could either nod or shake her head, she was buckled into the passenger seat of his car and he was clicking the door closed behind her. By the time he climbed in behind the wheel, she was all but vibrating.

  “When we get there,” she said, twisting her hands in her lap, “maybe you should wait in the car.”

  He didn’t say anything, just pulled the car away from the curb and headed toward the lights.

  “Or in the lobby I guess; it’ll be cold sitting outside and I don’t know how long I’ll be.”

  It didn’t feel like he was speeding, but somehow they’d already made it out onto the highway.

  “What time are you getting your hair cut because you can just leave me at Hillcrest and I’ll get a cab back. I could meet you on the north shore or wherever’s convenient for you.”

  “Relax,” he said, his voice so warm, so gentle, she almost did relax, and that was the last thing she could afford to do this morning. “Whatever happens, happens. If you want to stay all day, that’s what we’ll do. If you want to leave two minutes after we get there, that’s what we’ll do.”

  “Yeah, but you have things to do today, so you can’t be waiting around with me—”

  “Why can’t I?”

  Regan looked up, fully expecting him to be grinning back at her, but he wasn’t. He was serious.

  “Because,” she said slowly, wishing she had a better reason than her usual one.

  “Oh, right, okay,” he groaned, pulling out to pass a fully loaded dump truck. “Let’s get it all out of the way right now; tell me again how this is your problem, you’ll handle it on your own, no point worrying anyone else, nothing they can do anyway…”

  Regan’s stomach tightened and churned like acid was eating away at her nerves. Anxiety wasn’t anything new to her, but having him make fun of her only made it worse, made her angry.

  “That’s not funny, Carter.”

  “Do you see me laughing?”

  “You have no idea what it’s like.” She took a few seconds to breathe before she went any further, hoping it would help keep her fear and anger from spewing out. It didn’t. “You don’t know what it’s like to have your own mother scream horrible, vile things at you, you have no idea what it’s like to have all your ‘friends’ leave when they find out what she’s like, and you have absolutely no idea what it feels like when people look at Mom—or me—like we’re contagious or something, and if they get too close, they’re going to catch it. So until you’ve lived that, until you’ve seen their faces and heard their whispers, you’ve got no right to judge me or how I deal with it.”

  “I’m not judging you, Regan. You can deal with it any way you like, just let me help.”

  Silence filled the car, and while a big part of her felt guilty and horrible for bitching him out like that, the other part of her felt justified. She knew she’d have to find a way to open up to Jayne, Maya, and Ellie more about her mom, but she would do it her way, when she was ready. She wasn’t going to let anyone—not even Carter—bully her into dealing with it any other way.

  Clouds hung thick and low, reaching down toward the dark churning waters of Howe Sound as the wind howled through the crooked red branches of the arbutus trees. It was almost like Mother Nature was painting Regan’s mood for the whole world to see.

  Forcing long, even breaths in and out of her lungs, she leaned her head back and closed her eyes. In as much as she needed to be prepared for this visit with her mom, being tense as she was now wasn’t going to help; it was only going to make everything worse, and if this was going to be the last time she got to be with him, did she really want it to be like this?

  “Okay,” she finally sighed. “If you’re so keen on helping me…then talk.”

  “About what?”

  “Doesn’t matter, so long as it has nothing to do with where we’re going, or how I…” She sniffed quietly and grunted out the rest over a slightly shame-filled laugh. “How I tend to get a little uptight about people being up in my business.”

  Fact was, despite her minor meltdown a second ago, and as much as it freaked her out to know he was about to witness firsthand what it was like with her mom, Carter could have sat there and read her the entire Canterbury Tales in Old English for all she cared. The mere sound of his voice would be the soothing balm her fraying nerves needed.

  What the hell was wrong with her? Before she let him into her life, this wouldn’t have even been a problem; she would have been emotionally armed, and ready to take whatever came out of her mother’s mouth. But with him sitting right beside her, wanting to go with her, wanting to stay through whatever happened…shit! How was she supposed to brace herself against that?

  A slow smile tugged at Carter’s mouth, the tension in his face eased. “Did Jayne ever tell you about the summer we spent scrubbing out the church?”

  “The church?” Regan repeated. “No.”

  “It was back when Nick and I used to be altar boys and this one time—”

  “Whoa whoa whoa!” Regan’s eyes almost bulged out of their sockets as she twisted in her seat so she could see his face. “You were an altar boy? You?”

  “Ouch,” he laughed. “And yeah.”

  “Do you still go to church?”

  “Christmas, Easter, and any Sunday I happen to wake up at Mom’s.”

  “Wow.” Mouth hanging open, she couldn’t stop grinning at the image of Carter…Carter…wearing those long white-and-red vestments. “My mind has been effectively blown.”

  “Yeah, well, wait for it.” He pulled into the other lane, sped past a couple cars, then pulled back over. “We weren’t exactly…pious…if you know what I mean.”

  “Shocking,” Regan snorted loud enough to make Carter laugh.

  “Anyway,” he went on. “This one time, we were fourteen, I double-dared Nick to put a Whoopee cushion on Father O’Keefe’s chair.”

  “Not during Mass…” She knew what his answer was even before he spoke.

  “ ’Course.”

  “Carter!”

  “Yeah, I know, I was a little shit back then. Father wasn’t stupid, though, he saw it before he sat down.”

  “What happened?”

  “You mean after our mothers got through with us?” Carter winced, but his grin never faded. “Father O’Keefe was a good guy, but as penance, he made us scrub the whole building; every pew, every kneeler, every stained glass window.”

  “And Jayne helped?”

  “If Ni
ck was there, Jayne was there.” He glanced over at Regan with a shrug. “She did most of the work.”

  “That’s awful!”

  “Best summer of my life.” Another shrug, this one slower as his grin faded. Something about that memory wasn’t as fun as he was letting on, but Regan didn’t get a chance to ask about it because he went right on with more stories.

  He’d never been allowed to have a dog because his mom always said she was allergic, and he was halfway through high school before he found out she’d been lying to him the whole time. She wasn’t allergic, she was terrified.

  “Once I figured that out,” he said ruefully. “I really felt like shit ’cause I must’ve dragged at least nine or ten strays into the house over the years, figuring if she saw how cute they were, she’d let me keep them up in my room and they wouldn’t bother her.”

  He told her about his dad, how he’d died of a heart attack when Carter was ten, and how Nick’s folks had stepped right in and helped Carter’s mom out. How Nick’s dad had put him in braces, free of charge, and made damn good and sure he got into the university of his choice.

  There were stories about Nick and his first wife, Abby, stories about Julia and Rossick, and how the three of them met during the first week of university and had been together ever since.

  “Poor Jules couldn’t win,” he laughed. “She finally quit bringing guys back to the apartment because Rossick and me would either scare them off or hook them into whatever Xbox game we were playing.”

  “Why did she stay?” Regan laughed. “I’d have ditched you idiots and found my own place to live.”

  “ ’Cause we’re like family; we stick.”

  Regan’s insides warmed at how easily he said that.

  “If she’d ever brought home a guy we thought deserved her,” he went on, “we wouldn’t have been such pricks, but you should’ve seen some of the guys she went out with.”

  “From what I hear,” Regan snorted. “Your track record’s not much better, Sparky.”

  A slight blush crept up Carter’s cheeks as he ran his hand back through his hair, but he didn’t respond, just wheeled the car into an empty parking spot and shut off the engine.

  Hillcrest Psychiatric Home, with its vast hedged-in yards and grand pillared entrance, looked more like an old Southern plantation than anything else. The parking lot, never full at the best of times, only had about a half dozen cars in it when they arrived, and Regan guessed that half of them were probably staff vehicles.

  “You ready?” Carter’s voice was quiet, warm, and steady.

  Regan didn’t answer, just huffed out a breath as she slowly unbuckled and stepped out of the car. Chin up, shoulders back, she chewed her bottom lip for a second, then nodded.

  “I’m serious, Carter. You don’t have to stay; it’ll be fine, really.”

  “I’m staying.”

  “But—”

  “Staying.”

  It was almost the exact same conversation they’d had the day she closed her shop, and almost the exact same feeling fluttered through her belly. Terrified, relieved, oddly thankful, and not entirely sure it was a good idea.

  Tina met them at the front door and ushered them into her office, where she sat them down and went over the rules as she did every time Regan went in.

  Tina folded her hands on her desk and swallowed. “Even though New Year’s Eve went pretty well, and she spoke to you without incident, we were all surprised when she said she wanted to call you again so soon afterward.”

  “Yeah.”

  “She hasn’t mentioned either call, and hasn’t asked to do it again, but it’s been a long time since she’s been this calm for this long, which is why we’re hopeful that today will be different.”

  Regan nodded silently. They could hope all they wanted, didn’t mean she was going to go in there braced for anything but the worst.

  “Anyway,” Tina went on. “The rules are the same. Don’t try to touch her, let her come to you when she’s ready. If she’s ready.”

  “Mm-hmm.” Regan nodded again, knowing full well she’d never get to touch her mother again. Not today, not any day. And it didn’t matter how old Regan got, or how long it had been since the last time, the one thing she missed most was getting to hug her mother.

  “Don’t wander around the room, and try to keep the conversation light; weather, her dress, that kind of thing. If she brings up your dad, we won’t ignore her, but we’ll try to steer her back to something else.” She turned her gaze to Carter. “Will you be going in with Regan?”

  “Yes.”

  His answer was out before Regan had time to form the word no on her tongue. If it went badly, as it usually did, was that something she really wanted him to see? No. But having him there beside her in Tina’s office was more comforting than she ever would have imagined or was willing to admit, so when Tina looked at her for confirmation, Regan honestly didn’t know what to say.

  So she took the coward’s way out.

  “It’s up to him,” she said, then had to repeat it because neither one of them heard her.

  Carter’s eyes, so dark, so steady, softened when Regan finally looked up at him. Holding her gaze, he smiled ever so slightly. “I’m in.”

  “Okay.” Tina nodded. “Cal and Wes will stay in the room, just in case, and no matter how this goes, Regan, I’m limiting it to fifteen minutes.”

  “But—”

  “No. We both know it might be over before you even get in the room, but if she stays as level as she’s been for the last several weeks, we don’t want to overdo it. Baby steps, okay?”

  Regan nodded slowly.

  “And because we don’t know how you’re going to be feeling when this is over, there are a couple things I need to go over with you before you go in.”

  When Tina cast an uncertain glance at Carter, Regan just nodded.

  “He pretty much knows everything, Tina, it’s fine.”

  “Okay. I’m afraid it’s bad news on both counts.” Tina folded her hands on her desk and sighed. “The funding you applied for at the beginning of the year was denied.”

  Regan snorted softly. “No shock there.”

  “No,” Tina agreed. “But it’s going to make this next thing worse. The government, in all its wisdom, has decided that starting July first, they will only cover the cost of generic medications, and as you know, your mother’s system doesn’t tolerate the generic brand of her antipsychotic.”

  Regan closed her eyes, exhaled slowly, then forced herself to look at Tina while she went on.

  “So we have to decide what we want to do. We can either go through the process of finding her a different medication, something that—”

  “No,” Regan said flatly. “Not after the last time.”

  “I thought that’s what you’d say, and Dr. Kwan agrees, but our only other option is to keep her on the same medication, which means she would be responsible for the cost, and this particular one isn’t cheap.”

  “I know. It’s fine.” Regan knew exactly how much each and every one of her mother’s prescriptions cost, and she also knew with the annual increases coming up at Hillcrest, her options were limited.

  No, her options were nil. She couldn’t let her mother go through the torment of her doctors trying different cocktails on her again until they found another one that worked, and the only way to prevent that was to pay for her medication herself.

  And the only way to do that would be to go work for Griffin Carr.

  She could feel Carter watching her, but she knew if she so much as glanced his way, she’d turn into a weepy emotional mess and she didn’t have time for that.

  Tina’s careful gaze slid to Carter then back to Regan before she nodded. “Okay, then let’s do this, shall we?”

  Regan pushed to her feet and headed out of the office, but before she cleared the door frame, Carter’s fingers wound through hers, and with a gentle unassuming squeeze, gave her the strength she needed to keep walking.

&
nbsp; They stopped outside the visitor’s room to let Tina go in first.

  “Marlene? Regan’s here.”

  “Regan who?”

  Regan closed her eyes and inhaled slowly as Carter’s thumb moved over hers slowly, steadily.

  “Your daughter,” Tina answered. “Remember I told you she was coming for a visit today?”

  “Why? Why’s she here?”

  “To see you.”

  Marlene was in mid-grunt when Tina motioned for them to come in. Regan cleared her throat quietly and forced a smile as she stepped into the small room. Her mom’s hair, once as dark as night, was now almost completely gray and cut in a chin-length bob. She wore a pink-and-yellow-striped housedress with a yellow cardigan and a pair of knitted slippers—the kind with the pompom on the heel—the kind that slipped on the linoleum as she tried to scramble back, as far away from Regan as she could get.

  “She lets all the men fuck her.”

  “Mom…” Regan took a step toward her, but Tina stayed her with a raised hand.

  “We talked about this, Marlene, remember?” Tina’s smooth voice never wavered, never once let on that there was anything to be stressed about.

  “She’s a whore! Dirty filthy slut.” Marlene continued to back up until she bumped into the far wall, where she cowered in the corner, shaking her finger straight back at Regan. “Full of their infected seed! Don’t touch me! Don’t—”

  “It’s okay, Marlene,” Tina said calmly. “Why don’t we all sit down so Regan can visit with you for a minute?”

  Regan lifted her foot to step forward, but the second she moved, her mother fell to the floor, her hands fisted over her ears, and screamed so loud, Regan stumbled back a step and crashed right into Carter, who hadn’t moved.

  Cal and Wes, who’d been standing near the door the whole time, moved slowly into the room, each holding a hand out toward Marlene, whose screams continued to echo down the hall after Regan turned and walked straight back to the car.

  Carter stayed right behind her the whole way, but before she could pull the door open, he pushed it shut again, wrapped his arms around her and just held on, his chest pressed tight against her back, his arms like a vice around her shoulders. She fought against it for a second, but he just tightened his hold until she finally gave in, twisted around, and buried her face against his chest.